In the first trailer for Iron Man 3, we find a haunted Tony Stark being stalked by a new villain played by Ben Kingsley. YouTube

October 23, 2012

ADVERTISEMENT

Sign Up for

Our free email newsletters

10 things you need to know today

Today's best articles

The week's best photojournalism

Today's top cartoons

Daily business briefing

The trailer: Iron Man is ready to fly again — but based on the new trailer for Iron Man 3, which hits theaters in April, the typically irreverent Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) has fallen on hard times. (Watch the trailer below.) "Nothing's been the same since New York," Stark says, presumably referring to the events in last summer's The Avengers. "You experience things, and then they're over. I can't sleep, and when I do, I have nightmares." The Iron Man 3 trailer also offers the first look at Ben Kingsley's villain The Mandarin, who makes an explosive debut as he launches an attack on Stark's house, and numerous new Iron Man suits — one of which, perplexingly, seems to be attacking Stark and girlfriend Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow).

The reaction: After the disappointing Iron Man 2, director Shane Black is "under enormous pressure to steer the Iron Man movies out of that brief skid" — and based on this intriguing trailer, he seems to have risen to the challenge, says Katey Rich at Cinema Blend. This clip is "filled with everything you could want out of an adventure starring the armored Avenger," agrees Josh Wigler at MTV.com, including a dangerous new villain in The Mandarin. But the trailer is "surprisingly short on levity," says Michael Cavna at The Washington Post. The third (and perhaps) final entry in the franchise looks to be "deadly serious."